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Wednesday, January 8, 2014

New in New York: Crispy Rice Puts on the Ritz at Treat House

By Mitch Broder

Rice Krispies Treats were originally named Marshmallow
Squares, back when a company could actually miss a chance to name a thing after
one of its brands. The Squares were likewise humble. This made them ripe for
elevation. And they have now gotten that in the form of a store all their own,
named Treat House.

Prepared in your home, as originally intended, Marshmallow
Squares were a blob in a pot. It could be eaten in gobs or, if you had
patience, spread into a pan and cut. At Treat House, the snack is refined. It comes
in perfect cubes, in deluxe flavors. The Treats think they are cupcakes. Each
one wears a hat.

The Bubble Gum Treat, for instance, is topped by a wad of
Dubble Bubble. The Mint Chocolate Chip Treat is topped by a section of chocolate
mint patty. The Chocolate Peanut Butter Treat sports a jaunty chocolate peanut
butter cup, and the M&M treat, needless to say, is crowned by M&M’s.

These are gourmet Treats. They have been created by a pastry
chef. They make a better appearance at, say, your wedding reception, than gobs
from a blob. This explains why Treat House makes its home on the Upper West
Side, and why one Treat costs almost as much as a box of Rice Krispies on sale.

Still, Treat House is
not stuck up. It is a playful place. “Treat House” sounds like “treehouse,” so
the shop has treehouse décor. It makes creative use of logs. And in the back
you can sit on a stump and dine on Treats in a room that looks like it belongs on
a branch.

It all began in 1939. That’s reportedly when Mildred Day and
Malitta Jensen of the Kellogg’s company invented Marshmallow Squares. Legend
has it that they invented them as a fund-raiser for the Camp Fire Girls, but it
seems more likely that they invented them as a fund-raiser for Kellogg’s.

Seventy-two years later, Chris Russell got the idea for
Treat House. He really did get his inspiration from a fund-raiser. His sons
Daniel and Eli wanted to help children in Africa. They would have a bake sale.
Conveniently, they had a father who was also a chef.

Chris, with the help of the boys and his wife, Jennifer,
came up with three Treats: Chocolate Mint, Butterscotch Sprinkle, and Raspberry
Chocolate. The Treats sold out in two hours and netted $300. “A couple of weeks
later,” Chris says, “it dawned on my wife and me that there were so many
potential flavor combinations.”

They enlisted the pastry chef, Wendy Israel, and everyone pitched
flavors. They spent two years determining their Treat choices and techniques.
“We learned early on,” Chris says, “that if you just add ingredients to crisp
rice cereal, you get soggy crisp rice cereal, and nobody wants that.”

Treat House has been a smash. But for some customers,
the Treats take adjusting. “They’re not traditional Rice Krispies Treats,”
Chris explains. (They’re also not made with Rice Krispies.) “We pack them
denser than you would at home. So sometimes people’s expectations of what it should taste like are different from
what it does taste like.”

Fortunately, Chris believed that I should draw my own
conclusions. He gave me several samples
of Treat House Treats. I adjusted quickly. They were delightful. I was
impressed that the Raspberry Chocolate tasted like raspberry, and that the
M&M had M&Ms inside as well as on top.

The shop also has Treat Pops, Treat Breakfast Bars, and Treat
Ice Cream Bars. The Chocolate Mint Ice Cream Bar is what I’ll eat daily when I
decide to let myself go. The flavors change, but there is always a
choice of at least 12 Treats. And 10 cents per Treat goes to the Food Bank For New York
City, so the more you eat, the more philanthropic you are.

Chris was once an owner of the once red-hot restaurant
Moomba. This place is different, of course. But then again, in a way it’s the
same.

“If you want a two-dollar brick of Rice Krispies, you go the
deli,” Chris says. “If you want something a little more sophisticated, you come
here.”

Climb up to the Treat House, 452 Amsterdam Avenue, between 81st and 82nd
streets, New York City.

FOR MORE VINTAGE TREATS ON AMSTERDAM, VISIT THE HUNGARIAN
PASTRY SHOP, WHICH HAS BEEN SERVING ITS SWEETS SINCE 1961. IT’S AMONG THE DOZENS OF SPOTS
WHOSE STORIES YOU’LL FIND IN THE AMAZON AND BARNES & NOBLE BEST SELLER
“DISCOVERING VINTAGE NEW YORK”!

New York Chronicles

About Me

For twenty years, I wrote about New York for the nation's largest newspaper chain. Now I write about New York for the nation's largest Internet. I do this because I love to explore the city and to share what I've found, except when I'm greedy about it and decide to keep it to myself.
"Vintage," of course, means old, but it also means timeless. It's my defense for covering new things that evoke old New York spirit. But I mostly cover the best places that take you back in time, whether you are revisiting a time or just now discovering it.
On the street I still feel like a tourist, and I tend to look like one, too. These are perhaps my greatest qualifications. Among my others are some of the top prizes in New York City journalism, which nobody really cares about because they're not a Pulitzer.